Last night the moon, in all her fullness veiled,
Hung in the steel blue sky of winter’s night
Fell from her true face a nebulous shroud
Silently slipping o’er the starry sight.

Hoots of owl and shrieks of bat from below
Made competition, just as feline eyes,
Which cared not for the silver mournful glow,
With stealth stalked o’er the verdant grassy rise.

Such unfeeling works of poor nature’s lines
Neither see nor comprehend such beauty.
The moon rides high, and proudly shines.
She gives her light and asks no tax or fee.

For she receives from a greater sphere
In whose burning flame she pales her splendour
Fearing not to hide from mortal’s gaze and view.
And I, what would I have compared you to?

If it were not to the well-shrouded moon,
Should that be not less than I ought to say?
But were I to say, to the very same,
Would that not be then more than you should know?
Therefore, let me stand as did good Queen Bess,
And leave the question just as: Answerless.

Spring, now dressed in all her feral charm, has woken
daffodils, which lay hid’n in the sodden earth, to
repose upon the green velour of mossy banks
amid bluebells, who hang their pretty heads for to
woo the busy bees whose flight through the perfumed air
delivers the payload of their pollened legs to
each corolla, which, in winning her attention
enticed the bee with nectar sweet her work to do.
Long may this work go on, though spring it is too short,
yet when summer comes, and then the harvest time, will
another winter yield again to feral charm?
Glad may she now be on her dodecanal day!

However short the stay
All round you dare not delay
Reassured of change
You delineate the range
And manage the movement of all,
‘Til we come into line and see
In this your new way to be free